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THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
PART 5
CONSULTATIONS WITH
Mr. Joseph Pauco
Father Theodoric Joseph Zubek
Mr. Nuci KoTTA
Mr. Arshi Pipa
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
EIGHTY-SIXTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
DECEMBER 17, 1959
(INCLUDING INDEX)
Printed for the use of the Committee on Un-American Activities
UNITED STATES
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
48405" WASHINGTON : 1960
COMMITTEE ON UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES
United States House op Representatives
FRANCIS E. WALTER, Pennsylvania, Chairman
MORGAN M. MOULDER, Missouri DONALD L. JACKSON, California
CLYDE DOYLE, California GORDON H. SCHERER, Ohio
EDWESr E, WILLIS, Louisiana WILLIAM E. MILLER, New York
WILLIAM M. TUCK, Virginia AUGUST E. JOHANSEN, Michigan
Richard Arens, Staff Director
II
CONTENTS
Page
Synopsis _ 1
December 17, 1959. Testimony of —
Mr. Joseph Pauco 7
Father Theodoric Joseph Zubek 16
Mr. Nuci Kotta _. 23
Mr. Arshi Pipa 23
Index i
III
Public Law 601, 79th Congress
The legislation under which the House Committee on Un-American
Activities operates is Public Law 601, 79th Congress [1946], chapter
753, 2d session, which provides :
Be it enacted iy the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States
of America in Congress assembled, * * *
PART 2— RULES OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Rule X
SEC. 121. STANDING COMMITTEES
18. Committee on Un-American Activities, to consist of nine Members.
Rule XI
POWERS AND DUTIES OF COMMITTEES
O * * 4> • * •
(q) (1) Committee on Un-American Activities.
(A) Un-American activities.
(2) The Committee on Un-American Activities, as a whole or by subcommit-
tee, is authorized to make from time to time investigations of (i) the extent,
character, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States,
(ii) the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American propa-
ganda that Is Instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and
attacks the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitu-
tion, and (Hi) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress In
any necessary remedial legislation.
The Committee on Un-American Activities shall report to the House ( or to the
Clerk of the House if the House is not In session) the results of any such
investigation, together with such recommendations as it deems advisable.
For the purpose of any such Investigation, the Committee on Un-American
Activities, or any subcommittee thereof, is authorized to sit and act at such
times and places within the United States, whether or not the House is sitting,
has recessed, or has adjourned, to hold such hearings, to require the attendance
of such witnesses and the production of such books, papers, and documents, and
to take such testimony, as It deems necessary. Subpenas may be issued under
the signature of the chairman of the committee or any subcommittee, or by any
member designated by any such chairman, and may be served by any person
designated by any such chairman or member.
Rule XII
LEGISLATIVE OVERSIGHT BY STANDING COMMITTEES
Sec. 136. To assist the Congress In appraising the administration of the laws
and in developing such amendments or related legislation as It may deem neces-
sary, each standing committee of the Senate and the House of Representatives
shall exercise continuous watchfulness of the execution by the administrative
agencies concerned of any laws, the subject matter of which Is within the jurisdic-
tion of such committee ; and, for that purpose, shall study all pertinent reports
and data submitted to the Congress by the agencies in the executive branch of
the Government.
IV
RULES ADOPTED BY THE 86TH CONGRESS
House Resolution 7, January 7, 1959
* * * « * * *
Rule X
STANDING COMMITTEES
1. There shall be elected by the House, at the commencement of each Con-
gress,
(q) Committee on Un-American Activities, to consist of nine Members.
*******
Rule XI
POWERS AND DUTIES OF COMMITTEES
* * * * * 0 *
18. Committee on Un-American Activities.
(a) Un-American activities.
(b) The Committee on Un-American Activities, as a whole or by subcommittee,
is authorized to make from time to time investigations of (1) tlie extent, char-
acter, and objects of un-American propaganda activities in the United States,
(2) the diffusion within the United States of subversive and un-American prop-
aganda that is instigated from foreign countries or of a domestic origin and
attacks the principle of the form of government as guaranteed by our Constitu-
tion, and (3) all other questions in relation thereto that would aid Congress
in any necessary remedial legislation.
The Committee on Un-American Activities shall report to the House (or to the
Clerk of the House if the House is not in session) the results of any such investi-
gation, together with such recommendations as it deems advisable.
For the purpose of any such investigation, the Committee on Un-American
Activities, or any subcommittee thereof, is authorized to sit and act at such times
and places within the United States, whether or not the House is sitting, has
recessed, or has adjourned, to hold such hearings, to require the attendance
of such witnesses and the production of such books, papers, and documents, and
to take such testimony, as it deems necessary. Subpenas may be issued under
the signature of the chairman of the committee or any subcommittee, or by any
member designated by any such chairman, and may be served by any person
designated by any such chairman or member. ""
*******
26. To assist the House in appraising the administration of the laws and in
developing such amendments or related legislation as it may deem necessary,
each standing committee of the House shall exercise continuous watchfulness
of the execution by the administrative agencies concerned of any laws, the subject
matter of which is within the jurisdiction of such committee; and, for that
purpose, shall study all pertinent reports and data submitted to the House by
the agencies in the executive branch of the Government.
The best way
to eliminate war is the gaining of power
by Communists
all over the world.
Nikita Khrushchev,
addressing
the Third International Congress
of Miners Unions
in Poland,
July, 1959.
VI
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
SYNOPSIS
Firsthand accounts of Khrushchev's horror-filled subjugation of the
people of the country formerly known as Slovakia, the reign of terror
under which these people are presently suffering, and the inhumanities
currently being inflicted by Khrushchev's international Communist
apparatus on the people of Albania are related in the accompanying
consultations with the Committee on Un-American Activities.
SLOVAKIA
Joseph Pauco, secretary-general of the Slovak National Council
Abroad, describing the Communist subjugation of Slovakia, stated:
Soviet and Czech and other international Communists,
under the direction of Khrushchev and his secret police,
swooped down by the thousands out of the mountains and
forests upon the helpless Slovak population, savagely and
shamelessly butchering them and destroying their homes,
and occupied certain strategic public centers and buildings,
including military barracks, and proclaimed a violent revolu-
tion, the aim of which, according to the proclamation, was to
overthrow Slovakia's government and bind Slovakia to Com-
munist Prague and Moscow.
The partisans terrorized Slovak villages. They categori-
cally seized all citizens of note who had shown opposition to
communism. They robbed their apartments, homes, castles,
factories, places of business, warehouses. They indulged in
drunken orgies and began to annoy innocent victims, tortur-
ing and killing them. Thousands of Slovaks were subjected
to unspeakable tortures and inhuman torments.
:(: 4: iH 9N H:
Toward the end of the war in the spring of 1945 the Soviet
troops, together with the integrated Czech units of General
Svoboda, savagely occupied Slovakia and began the govern-
ment of the so-called People's Democracy under the control
and direction of Dr. Eduard Benes. The prisons began to
overflow, and concentration camps began to spring up every-
w^here. In the first month this "people's democratic gov-
ernment" not only ruthlessly incarcerated political opponents
of communism and Prague centralism, but also two of the
Slovak bishops and about 120 Catholic priests. It opened up
the so-called peoples' courts, which almost daily meted out
verdicts of death and frightful punishment against justice
and freedom. Thirty-seven Slovaks were thusly condemned
and executed for their political and national beliefs and
convictions.
2 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
Regarding the concentration camps presently in operation in Slo-
vakia, Mr. Pauco stated ;
* * * The main ones are at Novaky, Presov, and Mucenilry.
Quite a few hmidred Slovak political internees slave in
Jachymov, the well-known ui'animn mine in Sudetenland.
With respect to the deplorable economic conditions, Mr. Pauco
commented :
Unlike the tremendous prosperity, the high standard of
living, and the wonderful life and freedom which so glori-
ously prevailed during Slovakia's short-lived independence
under President Msgr. Jozef Tiso's leadership, and which the
people thoroughly loved and enjoyed, today just the opposite
exists. Today Slovakia's economic life is aligned with, and
conforms to, that of the Soviet Union. It is regimented in
accordance with the whims of the Czech-Communist regime
in Prague. It is thus that the State began one by one the na-
tionalization of everything and is establishing complete con-
trol over everything — public and personal, economic and
social, cultural, and even religious life. It has established
its own state factories and industries; its own utilities and
commercial enterprises ; its own state housing, hospitals, and
sanitoria ; its own state-controlled medical and other profes-
sions, trades, and classes ; its own cultural, social, and recrea-
tional, even religious activities ; its own state-owned resources,
forests, land and waters; and its own state-owned or con-
trolled communal farms. Thus over 70 percent of the farms
in Slovakia are already communized, that is, reduced to the
kolkhoz system, and farming.
"The Prague Government is frantically building in Slovakia arms
and missile mdustries and a great arsenal of atom bombs," Mr. Pauco
warned. Commenting on Khrushchev's recent tactics, Mr. Pauco
concluded :
They are overdone and sly. Communists have always
gone after their objectives well thought out and prepared.
Today it isn't necessary for them to proclaim a worldwide
proletariat revolution, when so many people amongst the
Western nations seem to fancy that there will be some fa-
vorable internal changes in the Soviet regime. Khrushchev
shrewdly casts about his soothing slogans, and we are encour-
aged and satisfied. The West acts as if it had discovered that
Khrushchev in this war of nerves, which he only prolongs
with his travels and visits, is achieving above all that which
is most important to the Soviet Union — the cracking of the
backbone of the subjugated nations behind the Iron Curtain.
Soviet proi)aganda can now contentedly publicize that the
West is not concerned about these subjugated nations and
that it will not fight in their behalf, for now the West only
desires peace and comprc»iiise with Khrushchev.
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 3
Father Theodoric Joseph Zubek, a Franciscan priest who escaped
from Slovakia, testified respecting the persecution of the Catholic
Church there, as follows :
* * * Male religious orders and congregations were sup-
pressed in April 1950. There were over 700 male religious
priests and brothers living in 137 monasteries in Slovakia.
They were taken forcibly to so-called concentration mona-
steries and were subjected to Communist-sponsored reeduca-
tion. If they complied with this brainwashing and took the
oath of loyalty, they were sent to parishes and churches as
diocesan priests. If they remained unyielding, they were sent
to forced labor camps, and later in 1957, released to manual
work. Clerics and religious brothers, if they did not want
to leave the religious life, went also through the forced labor
camps, and eventually to manual work on their own. A
similar fate met the female religious congregations. There
were 3,548 religious sisters in Slovakia, living in 210 con-
vents. The convents were suppressed in August, 1950, and
the sisters were forced to leave the religious life. If they
refused, they were sent to work without any salary in forced
labor camps, collective farms, or various state plants.
As to whether the persecution of the Catholic Church has been
moderated since Khrushchev's ascension to power, Father Zubek re-
plied :
On the contrary, in the last 2 years the Communists,
particularly in Slovakia, strengthened their efforts to elimi-
nate religion from the lives of the populace, Antireligious
courses, expositions, and publications have increased consid-
erably. The antireligious fight is considered of the utmost
importance, particularly in Slovakia, where religion is deep-
rooted and still has a positive influence upon the anti-Com-
munist stand of the majority of the populace.
In regard to the manner in which the Communists maintain con-
trol over the Catholic Church in Slovakia, Father Zubek stated :
The Communist control can be said to be twofold : public
control and secret control of activities of the church. By
public control, I mean the antichurch laws of 1949.
Besides, they have secret control of the church. Spies at-
tend every ceremony. They trail priests and bishops wher-
ever they go. I had some experience along that line myself.
I was trailed before the monasteries were suppressed. I saw
people shadowing me in those last months. I was also a
superior of a monastery. Each individual priest did not
experience this, but I, being the head of a monastery, was held
responsible for all proceedings in the monastery, and when-
ever I left the door of the monastery I always had someone
shadowing me.
.48405 •— 60— pt. &-
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
ALBANIA
Nuci Kotta, deputy secretary-general of the Assembly of Caj)tive
European Nations, and Arshi Pipa, former author and instructor in
Albania, described collectivization in Albania under Khrushchev as
follows :
Collectivization in Albania started in earnest in 1955;
that is, when Khrushchev was in the saddle in Russia. It was
pursued very energetically, and by 1956, 30 percent of the
arable land was collectivized, and the goal of the five-year
plan which is to end next year, in 1960, is to collectivize over 80
percent of the land. The Communist statistics now say that
about 75 percent of the arable land is collectivized. The
often proclaimed ultimate ojective is the collectivization of
100 percent of the land.
Mr. Pipa added :
I have seen indications of this fact myself. I was living
in my hometown Shkoder (Scutari) in September 1957,
when Premier Shehu came personally to that town to exert
pressure upon the peasants of the Shkoder district to enter
the collective farms. Shehu went to a village near Shkoder,
gathered the peasants, and threatened that, were they not to
accept collectivization, they would be considered traitors to
the country and dealt with accordingly. After that, most
of the peasants entered the village collective farm. It is only
by such methods that communism has managed to collectivize
the free Albanian peasantry.
"The age for penal responsibility for political crimes begins at
12," Mr. Kotta stated.
In regard to the program of cultural exchanges, Mr. Kotta com-
mented :
The Communist fraud in the whole program is that it
purports to identify in the minds of the free world the
Communist regime and the people whom they hold in bond-
age. You do not see in any of these cultural exchanges, in
their fairs, in their motion pictures, in their art work which
they send over here, in their ballets, any reference at all to the
terror mechanism of the machinery which holds in bondage
the millions of people that the Communists have subjugated.
You see displayed a little culture, which may or may not con-
tain Communist propaganda as such. But the fallacy of the
whole program is that it tends to convey to the minds of the
free world the concept that the so-called struggle between the
free world and the Communist world is a struggle between
peoples as such, that is, between the Russian people and the
American people, rather than between a deadly Communist
world apparatus and the remaining free people.
t* "p !{• !j! ^
What the Kremlin wants is to lull the West into complac-
ency. They are trying to get the West to recognize the status
quo, so that they may linally succeed in convincing the captive
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 6
peoples throughout the Communist empire that it is useless
to resist them, because they consider that the resistance of the
captive nations to communism is one of the major deterrents
to their plans of world conquest.
Mr. Pipa, who served 10 years in slave labor camps there, stated that
the Communists have installed in Albania a policy of forced labor, of
prisons, and of terrorism which is strongly opposed by the peasants
and intellectuals. He further stated that the opposition of the intel-
lectual class "has been repressed with a seldom paralleled ferocity."
Mr. Pipa continued :
I lived in Albania under Khrushchev's rule for nearly a year
and a half. I can, therefore, testify, about it. My opinion
is that Albania is now living under the same political cli-
mate as that of Stalin. The best evidence of this is that the
system of political prisons and forced labor camps is the same
as before.
* ♦ ♦ * «
Mr. Pipa further said :
I could testify that [in Albania] the forced collectivization
policy has been pursued under the Khrushchev period with
still more vigor than it was under the Stalin regime.
Commenting on the reaction of the people of Albania to compli-
ments accorded Khrushchev during his visit to the United States, Mr.
Pipa stated :
I would say they would be shocked at hearing it. * * *
When Albanians see, for instance, that sons are being trained
to spy on their own parents, they would be much perplexed at
the presentation of a person, who is to them the incarnation of
evil, as a good family man.
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
(Part 5)
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 17, 1959
United States House of Representatives,
Committee on Un-American Activities,
Washington, B.C.
consultations
The following consultations began at 10 : 30 a.m. in room 226, Old
House Office Building, Washington, D.C.
Committee members present : Hon. Francis E. "Walter, of Pennsyl-
vania (chairman) presiding, and Hon. Gordon H. Scherer, of Ohio.
Staff member present : Richard Arens, staff director.
The Chairman. The committee will come to order and the first
witness will be sworn.
Do you, Mr. Pauco, solemnly swear that the testimony you are about
to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,
so help you God ?
Mr. Pauco. I do.
The Chairman. Proceed, Mr. Arens.
STATEMENT OF JOSEPH PATJCO
Mr. Arens. Kindly identify yourself, sir, by name, residence, and
occupation.
Mr. Pauco. Joseph Pauco, Mounted Route, Middletown, Pa. My
occupation is that of journalist.
]\Ir. Arens. Now give us, please, a word about your own personal
background.
Mr. Pauco. I was born in Slovakia on February 26, 1914. I gradu-
ated from the Slovak University in Bratislava in 1942 with a Ph. D.
degree, after which I worked for several Slovak newspapers. I was,
in the years 1942-45, editor in chief of the daily Slovak.
In April 1945, 1 escaped with my wife and son to Austria. I lived
for 2 years in Austria, and then for 3 years in Munich, Germany.
Then, in April 1950 I came with my wife to the United States.
Since then, I have been Avorking as an assistant editor of the weekly
Jednota in INIiddletown, Pa.
Besides that, I am working in the Slovak liberation movement, and
presently I am secretary general of the Slovak National Council
Abroad.
I have written several books in Slovak and English, most of them
on anti-Communist topics.
Mr. Arens. Are you a citizen of the United States ?
7
8 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
Mr. Pauco. I am, since 1956.
Mr. Arens. By way of clarification of this record, please tell us the
location and political status of your former homeland, Slovakia.
Mr. Pauco. Slovakia is a country between the Carpathian Moun-
tains and the Danube River, bordered on the south by Hungary, on the
north by Poland, on the east by the Subcarpathian Ul^raine, on the
west by Moravia.
In the ninth century Slovalvia was an independent state, a kingdom,
then ruled over by the Hungarians. It was part of the Hungarian
kingdom for almost a thousand years, until 1918. Then, in 1918,
Czechoslovakia was created from two lands, Bohemia and Slovakia.
Slovakia was the eastern part of Czechoslovakia.
Then, on March 14, 1939, Slovakia declared herself independent. In
the spring of 1945, Slovakia was overrun by the Soviets and integrated
again with Czechoslovakia, which is still enslaved by the Communists.
Mr. Arens. Was Khrushchev directly involved in the enslavement
of Slovakia and its people ?
Mr. Pauco. It certainly is true to say that Klirushchev and the
Czech Communists destroyed the Slovak Eepublic and, without con-
sulting the Slovak nation or its people, imposed upon it the brutal
national front.
Mr. Arens. Would you be able to give us some particulars or evi-
dence of this ?
Mr. Pauco. Indeed. Let me show you this Communist newspaper,
"Prace," printed in Bratislava, Slovakia, under the date of August
6, 1959. It published, as you can perceive, an article entitled, "Lead-
ing Role of the Communist Party in the National Uprising," in which
it states, among other things, this :
In May of 1944 Gottwald arrived at the partisan head-
quarters in Kijev [Kiev] to discuss with Klirushchev, then
head of the Ukranian (Soviet) Government, the assistance
needed for (organizing) a partisan resistance movement in
the territories of (former) Czecho-Slovakia. In accordance
with these discussions, segments of trained paratrooj^s, well
experienced in organizing partisan movements, were dis-
patched to and dropped in Slovakia in July and August (of
the same year) * * *.
This, then, was the beginning of the savage mission undertaken
against the Slovak government and President Msgr. Jozef Tiso, a
horror-filled action known now in Slovakia as the "August Revolt."
Mr. Arens. What happened in this "August Revolt" of 1944 ? ^
Mr. Pauco. Soviet and Czech and other international Communists,
under the direction of Khrushchev and his secret police, swooped down
by the thousands out of the mountains and forests upon the helpless
Slovak population, savagely and shamelessly butchering them and
destroying their homes, and occupied certain strategic public centers
and buildmgs, including military barracks, and proclaimed a violent
revolution, the aim of which, according to the proclamation, was to
overthrow Slovakia's government and bind Slovakia to Communist
Prague and Moscow.
The partisans terrorized Slovak villages. They categorically seized
all citizens of note who had shown opposition to conununism. They
robbed their apartments, homes, castles, factories, places of business,
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 9
warehouses. _ They indulged in drunken orgies and began to annoy
innocent victims, torturing and killing them. Thousands of Slovaks
were subjected to unspeakable tortures and inhuman torments.
Among the first victims in this wave of terror was the Slovak labor
leader and Member of Parliament, Francis Slamen, who met his cruel
fate in the town of Brezno nad Hronom. He was a typical Slovak
laborer, one of thousands of diligent and honest Slovak workingmen,
providing for his family by the toil of his hands.
Another notable victim of the partisans was a Catholic priest and
Parliamentary deputy. Rev. Anthony Salat, who died in the first week
of the rebellion. He was a man of noble character, and his was the
stature of an earnest Slovak patriot, a brilliant popular writer,
a matchless public speaker, and one of the most outspoken and deter-
mined opponents of communism.
They dragged him out of the quiet of his parish to the bridge that
spans the Hron Eiver. He begged to be allowed to make his con-
fession, but the rabble refused liim this spiritual consolation. In
answer to his request they sounded off rounds of satanic laughter and
piercing ridicule which alternated with salvos from their automatics,
felling the good priest to the cold pavement of the bridge that he had
built for the community.
But even this did not satisfy the savage "liberators." They beset
the corpse of the murdered Father Salat and robbed it. Out of his
vest pocket they removed his gold watch ; out of his coat pocket they
took his wallet. They even knocked out several of his teeth and
claimed the gold caps from his dental work. Then they hurled the .
brutally abused and rifled body into the Hron.
Father Anthony Salat was not the only Slovak Catholic priest done
to cruel death by the partisans. Among others who perished under
the violent hand of the oppressors were Fathers John Nemec, Martinka
of Liptovsky Svaty IVIikulas, and the seminarian Milan of Povazska
Bystrica. A frightful death befell Father Seda, the pastor in Lip-
tovsky Svaiy Jan.
Singled out for sacrifice were also a number of valiant officers who
chose to accept no command in the uprising. For this service to their
country. Colonels Kanak and Zverin, as well as Lieutenant Colonel
Klucik and First Lieutenants Frecer and Sindler, were shot to death.
The distinguished General Turanec was put under house arrest in
Banska Bystrica right at the outset of the putsch. Once they let
loose the full strength of their partisan activities, they had General
Turanec flown to Moscow, where they tortured him for his uncom-
promising stand against communism.
One of the major stigmas of the putsch is the concentration camp
which the partisans arranged in the castle fortress Slovenska Lupca.
Here they tormented and persecuted over a thousand victims, not only
men, but women and children, too. The superintendent of this con-
centration camp was the savage Communist, Staudinger.
The housing of the prisoners was horrible. The overseer packed
over 150 people into a single room. Other sections were crowded with
as niany persons as could possibly be forced into them. Household
furnishings were removed. From the beginning, the prisoners were
bedded on the bare floor ; later the authorities allowed them to bring
in some straw. Spies, informers, and instigators of trouble were
10 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
planted anions the prisoners. Hygienic requirements in this concen-
tration camp became a thing of the past. The place was a real hell.
Inmates took sick as a result of the undernourishment, starvation,
filth, and foulness that prevailed. Instead of providing medical help
or relief for them, the vindictive jailer turned on them with abuse and
embittered their lives still further with inhuman treatment. Even
when the doctor did come into the camp, he was allowed to examine
a sick unfortunate only in the presence of the commandant of the guard
of national security. The physician prescribed medication for which
the prisoner paid but never received. Their daily fare consisted of
potatoes and cabbage.
The barbaric superintendent, a former shoemaker, on visiting the
confining quarters, abused the miserable inmates by kicking them about
like do^s while he cursed them fiendishly and threatened every one of
them with the gallows.
An evil reputation came to be associated with Kunerad, one of the
headquarters of the partisan band located near the city Zilina. Czech
Karol Bacilek was the political commissar in the fortress Kunerad.
Brutal in the extreme was the punishment meted out to anti-com-
munistic fighters, and quick sentences were readily executed. It was
comparable to Sklabina, headquarters of the partisans.
In the mass grave in Podsucha, there were found 80 victims of
partisan ferocity. In the mass graves near Sklenne, about 200 persons
met their deaths. Other mass graves were also found at Kovacova, in
Pusty Hrad, in the Prievidza Valley, at Humenne, Lucivna, Bosany,
Lubietova, Nemecka Lupca and Kremnicka.
During this Communist putsch, material losses in Slovakia were
extremely great. The state statistical and planning office in
Bratislava published in its "Statistical Handbook of Slovakia 1947"
an evaluation of damage inflicted on buildings, projects, and their
equipment, art objects, communications, livestock, and other ravaged
properties as in excess of 114,461,000,000 crowns, or $2.5 billion.
Losses in lives amounted to 70,000.
Mr. Arens. Do you have anything to add to this ?
Mr. Pauco. I was in Slovakia at the time.
Mr. Arens. What happened after this "revolt" ?
Mr. Pauco. Toward the end of the war in the spring of 1945 the
Soviet troops, together with the integrated Czech units of General
Svoboda, savagely oc<3upied Slovakia and began the government of the
so-called People's Democracy under the control and direction of Dr.
Eduard Benes. The prisons began to overflow, and concentration
camps began to spring up everywhere. In the first month this "peo-
ple's democratic government" not only ruthlessly incarcerat-ed politi-
cal opponents of communism and Prague centralism, but also two of
the Slovak bishops and about 120 Catholic priests. It opened up the
so-called peoples' courts, which almost daily meted out verdicts of
death and frightful punishment against justice and freedom. Thirty-
seven Slovaks were thusly condemned and executed for their political
and national beliefs and convictions. Indeed, every person seriously
interested or involved in Slovak politics or Slovakia's freedom and
self-govermnent or independence, if not condemned outright to death,
was iriven a life or 30-year sentence. On April 18, 1947, with the
gleeful approval of Dr. Benes, Msgr. Jozef Tiso, the President of
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 11
Slovakia, was executed, in spite of the pleas of the bishops of Slovakia
and of the Vatican itself. The premier of Slovakia, Dr. Vojtech
Tuka, was likewise executed.
Until 1948 in Slovakia there were two major political parties, the
Democratic Party and the Communist Party, which outwardly decided
the fate of the Slovak nation and of the anti-Communist leaders, and
both of these parties acted in these matters in unison, as one in a
national front. Communists, both before and after the elections,
which were in May of 1946 and in which the Communists lost out in
Slovakia, were assigned the leading and major positions in the so-called
or quasi "Slovakia's Autonomous Govermnent" (called "Committee
of Commissioners") . After the elections Communist Gustav Husak
became the head of this "Slovak Autonomous Government," and he
filled all the key positions with his followers, Non-self rule and sub-
servience to communism in this so-called "Democratic Party" became
obvious. Indeed, already in the same year of 1946 the Democratic
Party succumbed and granted its power and authority to govern to
the Communist Party, in spite of the fact that the Slovak nation
voted against the Communist Party and elected the Democratic
Party into power.
Neither the Communist Party nor its Slovak leaders, however, were
able to enjoy this enviable position and power in Slovakia, for both
Gustav Husak and his closest comrades were Slovak nationalists, who
after World War II hoped for a separate Slovak Soviet Kepublic.
The Prague rulers of the dual state initiated a secret and unscrupulous
purge of the Slovak Communist leaders. The first to fall was Vladimir
dementis, the leader of Slovak Communist intellectuals. As minister
of foreign affairs in the Prague, he fell into "discredit" so much that
in 1952 he was purged from his office and executed. Two years later
Gustav Husak was sentenced to life imprisonment, and all of his
Communist fellow workers received 10 to 22 years. Zealous Com-
munists though they were, to date not one of them has received a com-
mutation of his sentence or "mercy." Certain Communist leaders
simply, it is alleged, "shot themselves" or "suddenly died."
Mr. Arens. Who has the responsible leadership in Slovakia today ?
Mr. Pauco. Neither the government in Prague nor Moscow, that is,
no responsible Communist leader in Prague or Moscow, including
Khrushchev, trusts the Slovaks, not even well-trained and Prague-and-
Moscow-orientated Slovak Communists. This is evident from the
fact that the Czech Communist, Karol Bacilek, the supreme secretary
of the Communist Party, has the highest position in Slovakia. The
second supreme position is held by the Hungarian Communist Viliam
Siroky. Slovaks in the Communist administration have practically no
significant positions. The individuals who do have those positions
are all foreign Communists, mostly Czechs. Besides this there are
thousands of Czech troops and police in Slovakia. The secret police
force in Slovakia is wholly in the hands of Czech Communists.
Mr. Arens. How does the secret police force work in Slovakia?
Mr. Pauco. Already in the spring of 1945 the Czech-directed secret
police force, together with the Soviet Secret Police, operating in Slo-
vakia, seized some 30,890 hapless and innocent Slovaks and unscrupu-
lously and cruelly carried them off to the Soviet Union, probably to
the concentration camps in Siberia. In the following years this secret
48405'— 60— pt. 5 8
12 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
police force spent its time ferreting out and suppressing Slovakia's
unabating total opposition and abortive resistance movements. Almost
every year dozens of Slovak patriotic leaders from anti-Communist
groups or movements in Slovakia would be arrested, imprisoned, or
secreted away to some prison or concentration camp, there to suffer,
die, or vanish. The secret police would condemn them summarily, not
only for anti-Communist political activity, but also for shielding their
church or priests, or for defending and upholding or working for a
free, self-ruling, and independent Slovakia.
Thus in 1946 alone this secret police force imprisoned in Slovakia
almost 114,000 Slovaks. Most of these, after months and years of
wasting away under Communist torment, were eventually released,
but generally ruined and broken of body and spirit, usually ill and
emaciated from prison or concentration-camp brutality, inhumanity,
and starvation ; thereafter to be continually suspected, watched, and
hunted or persecuted. The rest, never to taste freedom again, would
be kept imprisoned for months or years even more inhumanly, with-
out a proper or decent investigation, much less a just trial, some miser-
ably to perish forever from improper, indecent, brutal, and inhuman
treatment or malnutrition and the like, and the other few, languish-
ing and awaiting trial or certain death, would be summarily, often
without notice, condemned and executed, sometimes even without any
public announcement.
Not infrequently the secret police, with loaded arms in hand, would
swoop down upon and raid private homes and apartments to terrify
the occupants and ransack their possessions; or they would, unpro-
vokedly, unjustly, and without warrant, merely break into citizens'
private dwellings and, terrifying them with their guns, search and
ransack the premises ; or, as it often happened, they would, with guns
or bayonets in hand, burst into a church during services, insult and
attack the officiating clergyman, or even rudely lay hold of him and
carry him off the pulpit during his particular religious or liturgical
service.
The tortures, indecencies, and inhumanities committed by these
secret police upon the Slovak people in Slovakia were the same, or
very similar, as those advocated and recorded in the writings and
records of the GPU and NKVD.
Mr. Arens. Do you have any reports of the present activity and
methods of the secret police there ?
Mr. Pauco. Yes, we do have. Just recently the Slovak National
Council Abroad received a trustworthy report from various Slovak
political prisoners in Czechoslovakia, reliably depicting the malcon-
ditions and maltreatment variously and indiscriminately imposed
upon the hapless Slovak political internees merely according to the
particular suspicions and unscrupulous whims of this police force.
For instance, an example in point is that of the Leopoldov, one of the
severest and cruelest prisons and concentration camps to which the
noblest and finest Slovak opponents of communism were and still are
sent. At present several hundred of them are thus incarcerated there.
Among the prisoners in Leopoldov was Bishop Jan Vojtassak, now
82. He was ordered to strip completely and made to stand on flagstone
floors for 2 hours. From time to time they were all forced to do
squatting exercises. WTien the aged Bishop Vojtassak was no longer
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 13
able to keep up with the exhausting exercise, the cruel warden shouted
at him brutally, "I'll give it to you I So your breath is running short ?
Get on with the drill 1 Squat, jump I Get on, even if it kills you I"
and he cursed savagely.
Some items of personal use and value belonging to the prisoners
were heaped up in a pile, and when one of the unfortunates complained
that it might be difficult to find what was his later on, the guard com-
mented cynically, "And why should you want it? You're going to
rot and die in this place, anyway."
Most of the prisoners were housed in solitary c^lls. As soon as the
warden knocked, however, all, even those in communal quarters, had
to give an immediate response by drilling squat- jumps at once, squat-
ting and rising at a fast rate and counting in a very loud voice. Often
they were required to squat- jump an average of 300 times a day; but
if the guard or keeper was in a mean mood or if a control commission
arrived from Prague, the requirement was raised to from 600 to 800
repetitions. No consideration was granted to the state of health or to
the age of anyone. Those who were overcome in the course of the
routine and blacked out were revived with dashes of cold water. This
happened more than once to Bishop Michal Buzalka.
Guards or even corridor patrols chosen by the commandant from
among trusties (mostly criminals) , for even the slightest cause and by
their own petty authority, would arbitrarily decree "punitive rations"
or "hard bed" to a prisoner for at least 14 days, sometimes even for
several weeks. "Punitive rations" meant that out of his normal
rations, which were already so miserly as to really amount to starva-
tion fare, an ill-fated prisoner would receive only a scant half. "Hard
bed" meant sleeping on the bare floor.
Imprisoned medics figured that normal week-day rations served to
the inmates provided from 800 to 1,000 calories per day ; Sunday serv-
ings offered from 1,200 to 1,400 calories — this in comparison with the
minimum of 2,400 calories which a grown man doing no manual labor
requires in order to maintain well being. Nevertheless, on the average
one-third of the prisoners were usually assigned "pimitive rations."
There was a fearful spread of anemia, malnutrition with attendant
swelling of the limbs, bleeding gums generally inducing loss of teeth
for want of adequate vitamins, etc. Practically one out of eveiy three
prisoners was afflicted with at least one of these ailments. Doctors
were helpless.
An inmate confined to a normal cell was subjected to from 300 to 600
squat-jumps a day, depending on the temper of his guards. A pris-
oner "in punishment," however, was ordered to do'more than that
number of squat-jumps. Besides, in a "correction block," they also
had to race from 20 to 50 times a day down the full length of the prison
corridor, clad only in their underclothes ; they were apportioned only
half-rations and had to sleep on the bare concrete floor. At night
they were often roused from sleep, and each time they had to respond
to roll call and do squat-drills. Some prisoners were detained here as
long as 2 or 3 months.
There were fears that the civilian population of the area might come
to aid the prisoners. Intimidating tactics were set in motion. From
watchtowers shots were poured into the cells of the prisoners, who
had to take cQver beneath their beds. The prisoners were not allowed
14 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
to sleep at all. They had to strip to their underclothes, and then
police dogs were driven into the rooms. No quarters were spared.
Even the prison infirmary, where lay mortally sick prisoners and
patients recovering from major surgery, was overrun by dogs that
raced about wildly from bed to bed and on the beds. All of them, of
course, were muzzle- free.
The performance of divine services, as well as the retaining or read-
ing of religious books, has been proscribed in all penal institutions ever
since 1950. Eosaries, crucifixes, and common prayer are also for-
bidden. Even the dying are denied the consolation of a priest, nor
may a priest perform any fimctions for the dead. At Leopoldov the
guards bury the dead in a state field on the other side of the railroad
tracks, not far from the grim walls of the prison camp. No mounds
mark the places of the graves ; they are identified only by small stakes
each with a number.
Church Holy Days, especially Christmas and Easter, are made most
unpleasant for the prisoners. All year long no meat soup is served,
but it was on Good Friday in 1956. Meat was also servecl on Christ-
mas Eve, a day of fast and abstinence in the Catholic Church. On
that day a surprise inspection team from the police patrols the quar-
ters to ascertain that no prisoners are at prayer or reading smuggled
religious instructions.
The prisoners long to receive the sacraments. All through the
records of the hard years, there is not even the rumor of any defec-
tion from the faith in the prisons. On the contrary, a number of
unbelievers have been converted.
Mr. Arens. Are there labor concentration camps in Slovakia?
Mr. Pauco. Indeed there are. The main ones are at Novaky, Pre-
sov, and Muceniky. Quite a few hundred Slovak political internees
slave in Jachymov, the well-known uranium mine in Sudetenland.
Whilst mentioning Sudetenland, let me call to your attention also the
fact that when the Prague Czech-Communist regime expelled over
3 million Sudeten Germans, it forced over 400,000 Slovaks from Slo-
vakia to work there with the view, first, to Czechize a great portion
of the Slovak population and, second, to weaken the Slovak anti-
Communist opposition and resistance in Slovakia.
Mr. Arens. How are the Communists doing economically for the
people ?
]\Ir. Pauco. Deplorably. Unlike the tremendous prosperity, the
high standard of living, and the wonderful life and freedom which
so gloriously prevailed during Slovakia's short-lived independence
under President Msgr. Jozef Tiso's leadership, and which the people
thoroughly loved and enjoyed, today just the opposite exists. Today
Slovakia's economic life is aligned with, and conforms to, that of the
Soviet Union. It is regimented in accordance with the whims of the
Czech-Communist regime in Prague. It is thus that the State began
one by one the nationalization of everything and is establishing com-
plete control over everything — public and personal, economic and so-
cial, cultural and even religious life. It has established its own state
factories and industries; its own utilities and commercial enterprises;
its own state housing, hospitals, and sanitoria ; its own state-controlled
medical and other professions, trades, and classes; its own cultural,
social, and recreational, even religious, activities; its own state-owned
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 15
resources, forests, land and waters; and its own state-owned or con-
trolled communal farms. Thus over 70 percent of the farms in Slo-
vakia are already communized, that is, reduced to the kolkhoz system
and farming. The Prague Government is frantically buildiiig in
Slovakia arms and missile industries and a great arsenal of atom
bombs.
Mr. Arens. Do the Slovak people succumb to, or believe in, the peace
slogan "peaceful coexistence" '^ Does it influence them ?
Mr, Pauco. Certainly not significantly. I spoke with dozens of
Americans of Slovak origin who recently visited Slovakia and, in
reply to this question, they invariably reiterated that, "The Slovak
people are praying daily for war, for they cannot see any other way
out of communism except through a major war."
Mr. Arens. You say that American Slovaks visited or visit Slo-
vakia. Were any of them prominent American citizens ?
Mr. Pauco. As far as I know there were only two better known
Americans, two clergymen, who were able to get in. The Prague
Communist Regime refused to grant visas to the others who wished to
visit Slovakia.
^ Mr. Arens. How did the Communist regime treat these American
visitors ?
Mr. Pauco. Since these visitors were uninfluential individuals, they
suffered no harm and nothing significant happened to them. A num-
ber of them, however, did mention to me that the Communist police
and authorities kept daily tab on them and on their comings and
goings, so that they were afraid to speak openly or to go everywhere
that they would have loved to go, lest they involve their relatives or '
even themselves. They did notice a lot of official Communist anti-
American propaganda over the radio and through the newspapers in
Slovakia, but the Slovak people there do not seem to be affected by it ;
rather, they resent it.
Mr. Arens. We know you were in Vinnitsa. Is that correct ?
Mr. Pauco. Yes, I was there in 1943 with the International Press
delegation. ^ I may reiterate here that I agree with the statements
of my Ukrainian friends who witnessed the horrors in Vinnitsa. This
visit of mine was my first shocking experience with the terrifying
brutality of the Soviets : people shot through the nape. I saw hun-
dreds of women, miserable widows and orphans, who sobbingly told
me of how this horrible and shocking tragedy was perpetrated. The
merciless crimes of Khrushchev in Vinnitsa are crying to heaven for
vengeance.
Mr. Arens. "What do you think of Khrushchev's recent tactics ?
Mr. Pauco. They are overdone and sly. Communists have always
^one after their objectives well thought out and prepared. Today it
isn't necessary for them to proclaim a worldwide proletariat revolu-
tion, when so many people amongst the Western nations seem to fancy
that there will be some favorable internal changes in the Soviet regime.
Khrushchev shrewdly casts about his soothing slogans, and we are
encouraged and satisfied. The West acts as if it had discovered that
Khrushchev in this war of nerves, which he only prolongs with his
travels and visitSj is achieving above all that which is most important
to the Soviet Union — the cracking of the backbone of the subjugated
nations beliind the Iron Curtain. Soviet propaganda can now con-
16 THE CRIMES OF lOIRUSHCHEV
tentedly publicize that the West is not concerned about these subju-
gated nations and that it will not fight in their behalf, for now the
West only desires peace and compromise with Khrushchev.
Reports from Slovakia indicate that the talks of and with Khru-
shchev in the United States had equally as terrifying an effect on the
Slovak people in Slovakia as did the inaction of the West in behalf
of the Hungarian people in the Hungarian revolt of 1956, or equally
as disgusting an effect on them as the West's abandonment of the
Tibetans last year or of the Laos today. It seems to me that it is
time that the civilized world took cognizance of the fact that discus-
sions and conferences with Communists lead nowhere and are ulti-
mately worse than useless, indeed harmful to the West. In my opinion,
the only way to deal with communism is to isolate Communist regimes
economically and militarily and, at the opportune time, if need be in
the moment of decision, to annihilate every Communist regime.
The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Pauco.
The Chairman. Call your next witness, please, Mr. Arens.
Father Zubek, do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are
about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth, so help you God ?
Father Zubek. I do.
STATEMENT OF FATHER THEODOEIC JOSEPH ZUBEK
Mr. Arens. Kindly identify yourself by name, residence, and occu-
pation.
Father Zubek. My name is Father Theodoric Joseph Zubek. I live
in Clifton, N.J., at 225 Ackerman Avenue. I am a religious priest,
Franciscan priest, and presently a teacher of religion in Seton Hall
University, Newark, N.J.
Mr. Arens. Father, give us, if you please, just a word about your
own personal background, including the place of your birth and a
word about your education and your early life.
Father Zubek. I was born in Slovakia on April 4, 1914, in the town
of Malacky. It is close to Bratislava, in western Slovakia.
My studies consisted of elementary schooling in the same village of
Malacky, then the gymnasium or high school, in Bratislava and in
Skalica. I graduated from that gymnasium of Skalica on June 9,
1934. I went through my theological studies in Zagreb, in Bratislava
and in Fribourg, Switzerland. I was ordained a Franciscan priest
on June 20, 1938. I finished my postgraduate theological studies in
October 1940, with a doctorate of theology. I was a teacher of
theology in the Franciscan seminary in Zilina, Slovakia, from 1941
to 1950, when the Communists suppressed all the monasteries in
Slovakia.
Mr. xVrens. Please give us in your own words just a thumbnail
description of what happened in your own personal life when the
Communists suppressed the religious orders m Slovakia.
Father Zubek. The suppression of the monasteries and all religi-
ous oi-ders came unexpectedly. They came to our monasteries during
the night of April 13, forced entrance, gave us 5 minutes to collect our
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 17
personal belongings, then put us into trucks and took us to an unknown
place. This place for us Franciscan religious priests and brothers was
Svaty Benedik nad Hronom.
Mr. Arens. Wliat happened then ?
Father Zubek. In those monasteries, called concentration monas-
teries, they tried to reeducate us as pro-Communist priests.
Mr. Aeens. What do you mean by reeducate ?
Father Zubek. By reeducation, I mean they gave us brainwash-
ing. In the morning and in the evening there was always at least
a short lecture about communism. Tliey brought in Communist
newspapers, such as Pravcla — this means truth, but it was all lies —
and we had to read editorials in it and take part in those discus-
sions, led by a pro-Communist president or chief of the camp.
Then, they gave us a condition. After the reeducation, they de-
manded the oath of loyalty to the Communist regime, as the condi-
tion to reentering the public ministry.
Mr. Arexs. Did you take the loyalty oath ?
Father Zubek. I did not, because I considered it something against
my priestly conscience.
I was looking immediately for a way to escape. We were working
in the vineyards, and that particular vineyard in which we were
working was close to a forest. I figured out how to get into the
forest and disappear. After one week I realized those plans and
escaped. This was in April 1950, and I went into hiding from that
time on.
Mr. Arens. How long were you in hiding ?
Father Zubek. I was in hiding for 9 months^
Mr. Arens. Then where did you go ?
Father Zubek. Then I went secretly over the border to Austria.
Mr. Arens. How long were you in Austria i
Father Zubek. I was in Austria for 3 months, and then I came to
Italy. I was called by my religious superiors in Eome to the central
office there, to give an account of the situation concerning religious
matters in Slovakia.
I applied immediately for an American visa when I was in Rome,
and it was granted in 1952. I came to this country on February 21,
1952.
Mr. Arens. Now, Father, by devices. which we have discussed off the
record, you have current sources of information respecting the situa-
tion in your former homeland of Slovakia ; is that correct ?
Father Zubek. That is correct.
Mr. Arens. "Wlien did the persecution of the church in Slovakia
begin ?
Father Zubek. The persecution of the church in Slovakia began
with the restoration of Czechoslovakia in the form of the so-called
People's Democracy, in 1945. In that year all schools were national-
ized ; no private schools, that is, Catholic, were permitted. Catholic
periodicals were for the most part suppressed. Church properties in
excess of 35 acres were expropriated. Many priests and three Slovak
bishops were imprisoned by the new regime. The whole structure
of the new Czechoslovakia was anti-Catholic. But in 1946 and 1947,
the church in Slovakia recovered somehow from these first blows.
The real trouble, a systematic persecution of the church, began when,
18 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
in February 1948, the Communists seized complete power in Czecho-
slovakia.
Mr, Arens. Wliat happened to the church organization in 1948?
Father Zubek, After the overthrow in 1948, the church was taken
under complete control by the Communist regime. First of all, all
Catholic periodicals and publishing houses, reestablished in 1946-47,
were suppressed. There were over 20 Catholic periodicals and 8
publishing houses in Slovakia. Only one publishing house, the
Society of St. Adalbert, was left to continue under its old, historic
name. But even that one was immediately put under complete Com-
munist control and forced to serve Communist aims. It is currently
publishing the Katolicke Noviny (Catholic News), a weekly, and the
Duchovny Pastier (Spiritual Shepherd), a monthly for the clergy,
both edited in the pro-Communist spirit.
Mr. Arens. Why did the Communists let the Society of St,
Adalbert exist ?
Father Zubek. I think that it was for propaganda purposes. Since
its foundation in 1870, the Society of St. Adalbert was deeply en-
rooted in the Catholic life of Slovakia. The suppression of this
publishing house would have been too much for Slovak Catholics to
swallow. Then, the Communists impudently pretend to be bene-
factors of the church. They try to keep up appearances of religious
freedom. According to the Soviet pattern, the Communists of
Czechoslovakia put into their new constitution of May 9, 1949, a
paragraph about religious freedom. They did not close any church.
They permitted the publication of the two aforementioned, so-called
Catholic periodicals and occasionally some books, such as a daily
missal in Slovak, or the Holy Bible. But they are doing it only to
boast that no harm to the church is being done. Actually, whatever
they left of the church organization is under strict Communist con-
trol and must serve the Communist regime.
Mr. Arens. Were there other instances of Communist encroach-
ments against the church ?
Father Zubek. There certainly were, and very many. To proceed
chronologically, I have to mention, first of all, the suppression of all
Catholic societies, reestablished in 1946 and 1947. No exception, not
even to preserve appearances, was made at this time.
Mr. Arens. Were some Catholic societies permitted later?
Father Zubek. Not exactly. But there was something which
should eventually be qualified so. It was on June 10, 1949, when the
Communists of Czechoslovakia tried to establish a Catholic pro-
Communist organization under the name of the "Catholic Action."
The genuine Catholic Action was suppressed in 1948. A year later,
the Communists gathered in Prague about 800 lay people and 70
priests who proclaimed themselves to be representatives of the Catholic
Church in Czechoslovakia. They established the so-called reborn
Catholic Action, whose pui-pose was to reinstate good relations be-
tween the church and state, after the official discussions about the
agreement between the church and state failed in March, 1949.
^ The bishops protested vehemently against this spurious organiza-
tion, qualifying it an attempted schism, and prohibited Catholics
from having anything to do with it. Also, the Holy See on June 20,
1949, issued a decree excommunicating all organizers, promoters, and
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 19
members of this organization. Despite the opposition of the hier-
archy, clergy, and faithful, the Communists still insisted on imposing
their "Catholic Action" upon the Catholics, which resulted in a great
turmoil throughout the whole of Slovakia. Slovakia during the sum-
mer of 1949 was on the verge of open rebellion. Hundreds of people
and priests were imprisoned in this connection.
Mr. Arens. Was the Slovak clergy in strong opposition to com-
mmiism ?
Father Zubek. It is quite natural that the Slovak clergy, knowing
the atheistic and antireligious nature of communism, was strongly
opposed to it. On the other hand, the Communists were fully aware
that the Catholic people of Slovakia, traditionally influenced by the
clergy, were also opposed to coimnunism as long as the influence of
the clergy persisted. That was the reason why since 1948 they started
to disrupt the ties between the clergy and the lay people, and to dis-
turb the unity of the clergy itself. First of all, they began to press
the bishops to conclude an agi-eement between the church and the
Communist government. The agreement was never concluded. The
negotiations collapsed on March 22j 1949, because the Communists
simply wanted the bishops' ratification of the Communist encroach-
ments upon the rights of the church and rejected all the rightful
demands of the hierarchy to guarantee the basic rights of the church.
Meanwhile, the Commmiists tried to get some priests to their side.
Those members of the clergy who showed signs of submission were
praised in the Communist press as good "patriotic priests," though,
m fact, most of them were rather mentally disturbed persons, at odds •
with their bishops and superiors. These priests assisted in the estab-
lishment of the so-called "Catholic Action^' on June 10, 1959, and sub-
sequently yielded to further Communist demands. But the bulk of
the Catholic clergy remamed loyal to their bishops and to the Holy
See, and was for a long time openly opposed to Communist pressure.
Mr. Arens. Did the opposition of the clergy lessen ?
Father Zubek. To some extent, yes. The reason was that the Com-
munists, after the failure of the discussions for an agreement between
the church and state and of their spurious "Catholic Action," in-
creased their efforts in dissolving the church organization. The
critical step in this direction was the new antichurch laws of October
14, 1949.
By Law No. 217, all religious matters were put under complete
control of the newly established State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Af-
fairs. All priests in public ministry were bound to take the oath
of loyalty to the Communist. regime. For any religious activity, the
approval of the Bureau was required. No assignment to any religious
office was possible without previous approval of this department.
By Law No. 218, after all church properties had been nationalized,
the government took over the economic safeguarding of the clergy
and the maintenance of church buildings. The trick of this law was
that economically all priests were put at tlie mercy of the State Bu-
reau for Ecclesiastical Affairs. The salaried priests became state em-
ployees. Tlie bishops protested against these antichurch laws. But
to prevent further damage to the priests and to the church organiza-
tion, they permitted their priests to take the oath and the salary,
with the restriction that they do not assume any obligation which
20 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
would be against Divine and Ecclesiastical laws or against tlieir
priestly conscience,
Mr. Arens. Did all the priests take the oath of loyalty ?
Father Zubek.^ Most of the priests did. Those who did not were
deposed from their posts, and most of them were imprisoned. The
bishops first refused to take the oath. Three of the ten Slovak bish-
ops were imprisoned, and on January 15, 1961, two of them were
sentenced to life imprisonment and one to a 24-year term. The re-
maining bishops were confined to their residences and prevented from
the administration of their dioceses. Additionally, three other Slo-
vak bishops were imprisoned. Andrej Skrabik, bishop of Banska
Bystrica, died on January 8, 1950, and a "patriotic priest" by the
name of Jan Dechet was appointed by the Communist Bureau for
Ecclesiastical Affairs as the administrator of the diocese. This gross
infringement brought about the delicate problem of church jurisdic-
tion. The situation in the Banska Bystrica diocese became quite
confused, and a dreadful precedent was set up for dioceses where
the bishop was imprisoned. To prevent a repetition of the case of
Banska Bystrica, and to save the church organization as much as
possible, three bishops consented to take the oath, on March 12, 1951.
Mr. Arens. Did the religious situation in Slovakia change with
the taking of the loyalty oath by the bishops ?
Father Zubek. To some extent, it did. In general, the open re-
sistance of the salaried clergy to the regime lessened. But it does
not mean that the salaried priests all became collaborators with the
Communist regime, or pro-Communists priests and bishops. The
original number of collaborators from the ranks of the clergy, about
50 all together, hardly increased. The only difference was that the
collaborators became much bolder and, under Communist pressure,
received quite important assignments in the church administration.
Some were elected by diocesan chapters of Canons as administrators
of dioceses and vicars capitularies; others were appointed as vicars
general or directors of chancery offices. The Communist-sponsored ac-
tivities of the salaried clergy are carried on mostly under the title
of "Clergy Committees for Furtherance of Peace." All bishops
and priests who are not in prison must take part in such activities.
They have to preach according to the themes prepared for them by
the State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs and delivered to them
through the chanceries.
Mr. Arens. Were there other important antichurch measures taken
by the Communist government ?
Father Zubek. Certainly, there were. One of tliem was the sup-
pression of all monasteries and convents. Male religious orders and
congregations were suppressed in April 1950, There were over TOO
male religious priests and brothers living in 137 monasteries in
Slovakia. They were taken forcibly to so-called concentration mon-
asteries and were subjected to Communist-sponsored reeducation. If
they complied with this brainwashing and took the oath of loyalty,
they were sent to parishes and churches as diocesan priests. If they
remained unyielding, they were sent to forced labor camps^ and
later, in 1957, released to manual work. Clerics and religious
brothers, if they did not want to leave the religious life, went also
through the forced labor camps, and eventually to manual work on
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 21
their own. A similar fate met the female religious congregations.
There were 3,548 religious sisters in Slovakia, living in 210 convents.
The convents were suppressed in August, 1950, and the sisters were
forced to leave the religious life. If they refused, they were sent
to work without any salary in forced labor camps, collective farms,
or various state plants.
Mr. Arens. What happened to the Uniates ?
Father Zubek. They encountered the most pitiful fate. On April
28, 1950, they were officially put out of existence. Similar to the
meeting that the Communists staged for the establishment of the so-
called "Catholic Action," they organized a gathering for the return of
the Uniates to the Orthodox Church. Under the Communist sponsor-
ship, 820 delegates with a hundred of Byzantine-rite priests met at
Presov and, purportedly as representatives of Slovak and Ruthenian
Uniates, proclaimed the secession from Rome and the return to the
Orthodox Church. Both Byzantine-rite bishops, Peter Go j die and his
auxiliary Basil Hopko, rejected the proposal to join the schism and
were immediately imprisoned. There were 320,000 Uniates with 319
priests in Slovakia.
Mr, Arens. Are new priests being ordained in Communist Slo-
vakia ?
Father Zubek. Hardly any. All the seminaries were suppressed in
1950. All four religious seminaries were suppressed, together with
religious orders and congregations. The diocesan seminaries, five in
number, were suppressed in August, 1950. Only one seminary, that
connected with the University of Bratislava, was reopened for the
fall semester of 1950. But the faculty was completely changed, the
unyielding professors of theology dismissed, and new, pro-Communist
teachers, including a lay expert on dialectic materialism, were ap-
pointed by the State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs. The num-
ber of seminarians is very small, about 40 altogether. Ordinarily,
8 to 10 theologians per year are ordained in the new seminary for the
priesthood.
Mr. Arens. Has the persecution of the Catholic Church been mod-
erated since Khrushchev's ascension to power ?
Father Zubek. On the contrary, in the last 2 years the Com-
munists, particularly in Slovakia, strengthened their efforts to elimi-
nate religion from the lives of the populace. Antireligious courses,
expositions, and publications have increased considerably. The anti-
religious fight is considered of the utmost importance, particularly
in Slovakia, where religion is deep-rooted and still has a positive in-
fluence upon the anti-Communist stand of the majority of the popu-
lace.
Mr, Arens. Did these last Communist efforts have any results?
Father Zubek. No, according to all indications. Always new
anti-Communists are being imprisoned in Slovakia. And those im-
prisoned and sentenced in many instances are not political opponents
in a strict sense. Many Slovaks were imprisoned and sentenced ex-
clusively for religious reasons. Among them were members of the
genuine Catholic Action existing in the underground. There were
young men imprisoned and indicted for secretly studying theology
for the priesthood. There were members of a secretly founded insti-
tution, living as religious brothers. There were groups of defendants
22 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
whose supposed crime was that they tried secretly to continue in their
religious life, banned in 1950. One group is liquidated, but new ones
spread out. It is clear that even nowadays the church is rejuvenated
with her own blood. Today, as it w as in the early church, the blood
of martyrs is the seed of new Christians.
Mr. Arens. How do the Communists maintain this strict control
of the fragments of your church which remain in your former home-
land of Slovakia ?
Father Zubek. The Communist control can be said to be twofold :
public control and secret control of activities of the church. By
public control, I mean the antichurch law^s of 1949, discussed previ-
ously.
Besides, they have secret control of the church. Spies attend
every ceremony. They trail priests and bishops w^herever they go.
I had some experience along that line myself. I was trailed before
the monasteries were suppressed. I saw people shadow^ing me in those
last months. I w^as also a superior of a monastery. Each individual
priest did not experience this, but I, being the head of a monastery,
was held responsible for all proceedings in the monastery, and when-
ever I left the door of the monastery I always had someone shadowing
me.
The matter of spying on sermons I also know about positively, from
personal experience. One spy came to me and asked about the topic
of my sermon, because he had fallen asleep during the mass in which
he was supposed to listen to my sermon.
It is a matter of general procedure that the Communists have their
spying system for all strata of the populace. In every apartment
building there is at least one spy for every few apartments. In small
houses, there is at least one person who is spying on the people. What
I would stress is, particularly for priests, for monasteries, there was
not one but many spies looking and going around, and it was not a
matter of one individual case, but it was something completely uni-
versal and general to our country from the beginning, since 1948.
And I am quite sure it stays the same way; that even now there is
strict control and surveillance by Communist agents of all individual
bishops and priests who still enjoy some kind of freedom, namely,
those who are not in prison. They are not really free, that is, but they
are at least not in prison, although under strict control and
surveillance.
Mr. Arens. Do you have information respecting Bishop Vojtassak?
Father Zubek. I knew Bishop Vojtassak when he was a free man.
He was quite a strong personality and very much outspoken in his op-
position to communism. After he was taken prisoner in 1950 and then
tried in January 1951, 1 listened every day to his testimony as it was
being broadcast on the air, in one of those monster processes they
had, and his voice was almost unrecognizable. The whole testimony
that he gave was so pitiful that I must say it was a completely different
man completely than I previously knew him to be. I assume, there-
fore, that they used some very special methods of their own to destroy
his personality so that he would testify in such a way that he showed
himself as a weak man unable to defend himself.
Mr. Arens. For the purpose of this record, tell us just a word about
Bisliop Vojtassak, who he is and what happened to him, a word about
his case, please.
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 23
Father Zubek. Bishop Vojtassak is the residential bishop of the
Spis Diocese. He was very active in cultural matters of Slovakia as
well as in his religious work. He was considered one of the best and
most beloved bishops of Slovakia. He had difficulties with the new
Czechoslovakian pro-Communist regime immediately, beginning in
1945, when he expressed his opposition to the new regime, and he was
for seven months in prison at that time in 1945. Then he was released,
and he continued his work as bishop of the diocese ; but in 1948, when
the Communists took over, he must have been under Communist sur-
veillance quite strictly, because in the common bishops' meetings he did
not take part. His signature does not appear on several of the com-
mon statements by other bishops, so I assume that since 1948 he was
put aside by the Communists. But he was still not imprisoned until
the summer of 1950, and in 1951 he was sentenced to 24 years of
imprisonment.
Mr. Akens. What was the offense charged against him ?
Father Zubek. It was a made-up offense charged by the Com-
munists, the usual thing : treason, sabotage, espionage for American
imperialists, and similar charges, completely without any grounds,
without any foundation.
Mr. Arens. Father, based upon your firsthand observations and
experience with communism in action, as distinct from the communism
that is portrayed by its propagandists and apologists, can the free
world coexist with communism?
Father Zubek. No, sir. They have proved so many times that they
are completely unreliable, that for them the end is the good of the
Communist Party, and behind it, world domination is what they have
in their minds. For that purpose, they would do anything. If the cold
war does not achieve it, then they will use other tricks. One of these
tricks, I think, is the "coexistence" that they are propagandizing now.
But coexistence in their minds, as I know the Communist structure,
Communist trickery, means that they want to take over through in-
filtration and through cheating other people, putting them into a
kind of sleep or napping. Appeasement is what they want on the part
of America, and through that appeasement they hope to achieve their
aims, which they were unable to achieve through the cold war. That
is my opinion. I don't think there can be any ^ood result from the
free world going along the lines of Communist propaganda for
coexistence.
The Chairman. We thank you very much, Father Zubek.
Mr. Ajrens. The next witnesses will be Messrs. ICotta and Pipa.
The Chairman. Do you solemnly swear, Mr. Kotta and Mr. Pipa,
that the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole
truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God ?
Mr. Kotta. I do.
Mr. Pipa. I do.
STATEMENTS OE NUCI KOTTA AND ARSHI PIPA
Mr. Arens. Kindly identify yourself, Mr. Kotta, by name, residence,
and occuj)ation.
24 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
Mr. KoTTA. My name is Nuci Kotta. I live at 304 West 106th Street,
New York City, and I am presently deputy secretary general of the
Assembly of Captive European Nations.
Mr. Arens. Give us, if you will, please, sir, a brief sketch of your
personal life and background.
Mr. KoiTA. I am an Albanian exile, and was born in Albania. I
left my country in 1938 to go to study in Paris. In 1939 Albania was
invaded by the Italian Fascists, and I have not returned there since.
Mr. Arens. Give us just a word, if you please, about your profes-
sional career.
Mr. KoTTA. I have a degree of doctor of laws from the University
of Paris. I have taught Albanian at the National School of Spoken
Oriental Languages of the University of Paris. In 19-19 I became a
member of the National Committee for a Free Albania. I was a
member of that committee until 1953. Since 1955 I have been the
deputy secretary general of the Assembly of Captive European
Nations.
Mr. Arens. Now, Mr. Pipa, would you in like manner give us a word
of identification of yourself : Your residence, occupation, and a brief
resume of your personal background.
Mr. Pipa. I was born in Albania in 1920. I am a graduate of the
University of Florence, with the degree of doctor in philosophy. I
have in the past been a teacher of philosophy in Albania. I have
edited an Albanian literary review, and have published a book of
poems and other writings.
The regime in Tirana arrested me because of my critical attitude
towards communism, which I did not accept. As a result, I spent
10 years in various prisons and slave labor camps in Albania. After
being released from prison, I escaped into Yugoslavia, and in 1958
I came to the United States as a permanent resident.
Mr. Arens. Now, gentlemen, may I suggest as I pose a question
to you, that either of you respond as you think appropriate; or, after
one of you has spoken on a particular subject, the other may amplify
his comments.
First of all, may I ask, for the purpose of clarification of the record,
a word about Albania itself. Please tell us where it is located and
any strategic significance it has in the power struggle in the world,
and any other items of information of like character.
Mr. KoTTA. Albania is situated in the Balkan Peninsula on the
Adriatic shore. Its area is of about 12,000 square miles, and the popu-
lation is 1,500,000, not to mention a minority of about 1,000,000 Al-
banians in Yugoslavia.
The strategic importance of Albania resides mainly in the fact that
the Bay of Valona, which has been transformed by the Soviet Union
into a powerful submarine base, would enable the Soviet Union, in
case of war, to imperil allied navigation all over the Mediterranean.
The Mediterranean is very important to the West because it is the lane
through which logistical support can go to the very sensitive southern
flank of NATO, constituted of Greece and Turkey.
The southern flank of NATO is very dangerous for the Soviet
Union, because the center, Baku, which produces most of the oil in
the Soviet Union, is less than 2O0 miles from the easternmost part
of Turkey; and if it were to be occupied by the Allies, in case of
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 25
war, the Soviet Union -would be unable to continue the pursuit of
the war. This is why the Soviets consider that it is most important
to neutralize the southern flank of NATO. This is why they have
built their submarme base in Valona, in order to render impossible the
logistical support of Turkey and Greece in case of war.
Mr. Arens. Gentlemen, will you kindly give us a brief history
of the political control of Albania in the course of the last several
years?
Mr. PiPA. Albania won its independence in 1912, and remained in-
dependent until 1939, when it was invaded by Fascist Italy. In 1943,
the Nazi army occupied our territory.
Albania was liberated in 1944. A large part of the forces of liber-
ation were composed of patriotic Albanians who had been artfully
deceived by Communist leaders into following them. There were also
several nationalist groups and parties during the war, but the Com-
munists managed to bring them down with their terroristic methods
and with the effective help of the Yugoslav Communists. As a result,
communism came into power in Albania, and, from that time, until
now, has been ruling Albania so as communism rules, i.e. through
methods which are unacceptable to the free world, and to freedom-
loving people throughout the world.
It is because of such terroristic methods that the Albanian people,
although in overwhelming majority opposed to communism, have not
been able yet to overthrow its regime. The opposition has been par-
ticularly strong among the peasants and the intellectuals. The peas-
antry hate the collectivization policy of the regime. As for the
intellectual class, its opposition has been repressed with a seldom
paralleled ferocity.
Mr. Arens. Mr. Pipa, there recently left these sliores the head of
the international Communist apparatus, Nikita Klirushchev, who
was portrayed by the highest of our officialdom in this country as a
friendly, genial man, a family man, who would be deserving of all
the amenities accorded a representative of the friendliest power.
Have you had any occasion to experience the impact of Khrushchev's
international Communist apparatus in your own life during the
period of your residency in Albania ?
Mr. Pipa. Durmg the greatest part of my imprisonment, the Alba-
nian Communist regime had been characterized by the terrorism of
Stalin. I might describe the situation after my release from prison.
I lived in Albania under Khrushchev's rule for nearly a year and a
half. I can, therefore, testify about it. My opinion is that Albania
is now living under the same political climate as that of Stalin. The
best evidence of this is that the system of political jorisons and forced
labor camps is the same as before. A total, estimated from 12,000 to
14,000 people, still live in slavery in such places.
Mr. Arens. In the recent past we have seen articles by certain
columnists and others who have journeyed to Moscow, to the effect
that Khrushchev is becoming more benign and is eliminating the
terror mechanisms which prevailed during Stalin's regime. Would
you care, on the basis of firsthand knowledge, to comment on that?
Mr. Pipa. Others may think about Khrushchev as they like. I per-
sonally think that he is just the faithful disciple of Stalin. His
methods are not essentially different from those of his predecessor.
The Beria case may serve as an example. Hungary is another.
26 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
As for Albania, I could testify that the forced collectivization pol-
icy has been pursued under the Khrushchev period with still more
vigor than it was under the Stalin regime.
Mr. KoTTA. As a matter of fact, I would like to give some details on
that.
By 1953 the Communist regime, in the person of Premier Shehu,
had admitted that collectivization in Albania had been a failure,
inasmuch as 94 percent of the agricultural output was produced by
individual farmers.
Collectivization in Albania started in earnest in 1955 ; that is, when
Khrushchev was in the saddle in Russia. It was pursued very
energetically, and by 1956, 30 percent of the arable land was col-
lectivized, and the goal of the five-year plan which is to end next year,
in 1960, is to collectivize over 80 percent of the land. The Communist
statistics now say that about 75 percent of the arable land is collec-
tivized. The often proclaimed ultimate objective is the collectiviza-
tion of 100 percent of the land.
If you consider that the peasant — and I would say maybe even
more so a peasant of a mountainous country — sticks to his land, does
not want to abandon it, to give up his land. We have the example
of Poland after the events of the Hungarian revolution in October
1956, where as soon as the peasants were free, they abandoned their
collective farms and took up farming for themselves. If you consider
that, then you must admit that these collectivization activities are the
best proof of the fact that there is in Albania, since Khrushchev has
been in power in the Soviet Union, no liberalization of the regime as
has been claimed.
Mr. PiPA. I have seen indications of this fact myself, I was living
in my hometown Shkoder (Scutari) in September 1957, when Premier
Shehu came personally to that town to exert pressure upon the peas-
ants of the Shkoder district to enter the collective farms. Shehu went
to a village near Shkoder, gathered the peasants, and threatened that,
were they not to accept collectivization, they would be considered
traitors to the country and dealt with accordingly. After that, most
of the peasants entered the village collective farm. It is only by such
methocls that communism has managed to collectivize the free Al-
banian peasantry.
Mr. KoTTA. If I may interject, Mr. Arens, I think that Mr. Pipa
might be in a position to give additional information about the ter-
roristic measures used by tlie Communists to enforce collectivization
and also about life in the collectivized farms.
Mr. Arens. Could you give us a word on that, please, sir, from your
own personal experience, Mr. Pipa ?
Mr. PirA. The prisons and the labor camps were, to the day I left
Albania, full of peasants who have opposed collectivization. The in-
surrection of the peasantry in Postriba in 1946 can prove this. Many
peasants were massacred on that occasion, and many others have sub-
sequently suffered death after various attempts, individually or in
groups, to resist collectivization. As a fresh specimen of this resist-
ance I could relate the case of two Albanian escapees whom I met in
Yugoslavia. Tliey told me that they hated to live in collective farms,
and that "they preferred death to such a life." When I asked them
what about all this horror of collectivization, they explained to me
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 27
that collectivization implies slavery. In collective farms one cannot
work for himself, he must work for the state, just as a salaried worker;
moreover, one is deprived of familiar intimacy and is not allowed to
worship.
Mr. Arens. Is Albania coexisting now with the Soviet Union ?
Mr. KoTTA. In Albania we have the typical coexistence of tlie op-
pressor with the oppressed. As the other captive countries, Albania
IS, for all practical purposes, a colony of the Soviet Union. The
Communist-imposed constitution is patterned upon that of the fed-
erated republics of the Soviet Union. The laws are patterned upon
those of the Soviet Union. Because of the resistance of the Albanian
people to the regime, however, the penal code is even harsher than its
Soviet model. Following that code, adopted in 1952, the age for
penal responsibility for political crimes begins at 12. A boy or a girl,
a child of 12 could be sent to prison for crimes against the state.
Last December the age was changed to 14^ but I doubt whether in
practice this would make much difference.
Mr. Arens. What would be the nature of a crime against the state
for which they could send a boy of 12 to prison ?
Mr. KoTTA. Anything, practically. The judges who sit on trials are
called the people s judges, and they have practically everything in
their power. They can do whatever they want. They are not profes-
sional judges.
The lawyers themselves are forced to be, as the Minister of Justice
said — and I could perhaps give you the date of this — accessories of
Communist justice; they are forced to help the prosecution. Not only
this, but also they are obliged to tell whatever secrets they have
learned from the accused, to the prosecutor. The basic aim of the
Communist criminal legislation is to "protect" the so-called People's
Democratic State and to destroy the enemies of the regime. As a
result, according to conservative estimates based on reports by es-
capees— the Communists, of course, do not publish statistics of their
crimes — about 10,000 people have been killed with or without trial,
Mr. Arens. Do you suppose Khrushchev, this benign, friendly man,
as he is portrayed by certain of our officialdom, would countenance
sending to the penitentiaiy for political crimes children only 12 years
of age ?
Mr. KoTTA. The penal code was adopted in 1952. With the ex-
ception of the amendment of December 1958 which I just mentioned, it
has remained unchanged. It has not been abrogated. And now,
Mr. Khrushchev, this benign man, as you have called him, is the
master in Albania ; and since this penal code has not been repealed,
then you must assume that he would send children to prison.
Mr, Arens. Were reports of Khrushchev's visit here and the state-
ments made about him disseminated in Albania to these people who
are in this slave state?
Mr. KoTTA. Very much so.
Mr. Arens. I would like to read you a quotation from the Washing-
ton Evening Star of September 28, 1959, as follows :
Describing the meeting of Premier Khrushchev with the
Eisenhower grandchildren at his Gettysburg farm, the Presi-
dent said it w^as a *'heart-warming scene" of the sort that all
Americans would enjoy.
28 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
Assuming that this public statement is disseminated behind the Iron
Curtain to the people who are held in subjugation by Khrushchev's
terror apparatus, what will be their reaction to this type of official
statement by the head of the government of the free world?
Mr. KoTTA. Undoubtedly it will be a blow to their morale. I would
like to add to this that, as a general rule, any meeting of a Soviet
ruler with a Western leader would be a blow to the morale of the
captive peoples unless this Western leader raises, at that meeting, the
question of the restoration of freedom and independence to the cap-
tive nations and presses for an equitable solution of this grave
problem.
]\Ir. PiPA. I would say that they would be shocked at hearing it.
:Mr. Arens. Why ?
Mr. PrPA. Because, as a matter of fact, family life in Albania — I
refer to family as the ethical institution which has been so strongly
respected before communism's advent — is being systematically de-
stroyed. When Albanians see, for instance, that sons are being
trained to spy on their own parents, they would be much perplexed at
the presentation of a person, who is to them the incarnation of evil, as
a good family man.
Mr. Arens. Do you have information respecting economic exploita-
tion of Albania under Khrushchev's Communist apparatus ?
Mr. KoTTA. Yes. In this respect, I may state the following. Since
the Communists came into power and particularly since Khrushchev
gained control in the Kremlin, there has been an acceleration of
the drive toward industrialization of Albania. Before World War
II, Albania was mainly an agricultural country, with very little indus-
try. Adding more industry to an agricultural country is not a bad
thing in itself, provided it serves the interests of the people. But
this is not the case in Albania now under communism, because the
industrialization of Albania means practically just the mining of cop-
per and chromium ore.
By the way, in Albania are the richest deposits of chromium ore
in eastern Europe, jDroducing over 7 percent of the entire output of
the Communist-dominated world.
This chromium ore, and copper and other minerals, as well as oil,
are extracted in Albania and sent to the Soviet Union, which buys
them at ridiculous prices. The investments for this industrialization,
so-called, of Albania are so much greater than the investments for the
agriculture that, as a result, Albania is not in a position now to pro-
duce enough food for its own people. In addition, the presence of a
very large num])er of Soviet agents of all sorts, who enjoy a standard
of living well above not only that of the people, but even of the Al-
banian Communists, is a heavy burden on the Albanian economy.
Also a relatively very large army — which the regime maintains in
order to have youth under control — deprives the agriculture of a much
needed manpower.
That is why, until 2 years ago, there was rationing in Albania;
and now, even though the ration tickets have been abandoned, the
diet of the Albanian people is still a starvation diet.
Mr. Arens. Do you have information as to whether or not there is
freedom of religion in Albania under Khrushchev's regime ?
Mr. PirA. Religion has never been free in Albania since communism
came into power, and the situation is still the same at present. Al-
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 29
though the Communist rulers have many times stated that there is
freedom of religion in Albania, the major fact is that the persons who
are the heads of the various Albanian churches are people chosen by
the government and not by the Albanian people. Everybody knows
that communism is an atheistic doctrine which is opposed to any form
of religious faith. The Communist leaders do not make any secret of
the fact that communism is trying to wipe out any vestige of former
religious education. It is, therefore, contradictory to assert any free-
dom of religion on such premises.
Mr. KoTTA. May I interrupt ? I have some figures about the perse-
cution of the Catholic clergy in Albania which are very interesting.
Mr. Arens. Would you kindly proceed to present them ?
Mr. KoTTA. At the end of 1950, out of 93 Albanian Catholic priests,
17 had been executed, 39 had been imprisoned, and many of these have
since died in prison or concentration camps.
Mr. PiPA. I could testify to that. I would like to mention here in
particular the case of Msgr. Prennushi, who was my roommate at the
Durres (Durazzo) prison. I have been told by him about the tor-
tures he underwent at the security section of Durres. I have wit-
nessed myself his being offended and even tortured during his im-
prisonment. In the same prison of Durres, after horrible tortures,'
the head of the Moslem Church of Durres, Mustafa Varoshi, died.
Mr. KoTTA. Eleven have been drafted into the army as ordinary
soldiers, 10 have died, and 3 have escaped into the free world. Only 13
still remain free.
Out of 94 monks, Franciscans and Jesuits, 16 have been executed, 31
expelled, 35 imprisoned, 6 have died, and 6 were in hiding.
Mr. Arens. Wliat is the source of this information ?
Mr. KoTTA. The source of my information is the Albanian priests
who have escaped from Albania.
The Archbishop, head of the Albanian Catholic Church, Monsei-
gneur Vincenc Prennushi, died in prison. Bishop Volaj was shot
and Archbishop Gjoni was shot.
The nuns were expelled from their convents. All church properties,
of course, have been confiscated.
Catholic institutions in 1945, when the Communists took over, were
as f ollow^s : 253 churches and chapels, 2 seminaries, 10 monasteries, 20
convents, 15 orphanages and asylums, 16 church schools, and 10 chari-
table institutions. In 1953, only 100 churches and chapels and 2 mon-
asteries were still open. All the other institutions have been closed.
The printing presses belonging to the church and the seven periodi-
cals published by the church, have been suppressed.
The drive against the Catholic Church still continues, and many of
the remaining churches have been closed or transformed into recrea-
tional halls for the party. The seminaries are closed, as there are not
enough priests alive or free. Many Catholics have little opportunity
now to practice their religion.
The Moslem and Orthodox churches, although perhaps less severely
suppressed, have not fared much better. They have been deprived of
their rightful leaders who have been replaced by subservient tools of
the regime. The faithful may lose their jobs if they frequent the
30 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
cliurclies. And when one loses liis job in the captive nations, this
often means that he loses the right to work as well.
Mr. Arens. May I inquire, if there were a free election tomorrow
in Albania, would the Communists receive the majority of the votes?
]\Ir. PiPA. I would say that they never would receive a majority of
the votes in Albania if there were free elections. I know personally
that all strata of the j)eople are opposed to communism. They cannot
make an insurrection to throw down communism, however, because
the regime is so atrocious, so terroristic, that they cannot dare to
attempt it.
Mr, KoTTA. That is true today. However, it was not so until re-
cently. After the Cominform expelled Tito in 1948, Albania ceased
to have common borders with the rest of the Soviet empire and the
Albanians could have overthrown the Communist regime by them-
selves. The main conditions for a successful revolt were there : dis-
content of the overwhelming majority of the population and armed
resistance in the mountains. All that was needed was some material
support and a Western guaranty of the independence and territorial
integrity of the country. Unfortunately, these were not given and,
after the so-called Warsaw Pact and the repression of the Hungarian
revolution, the opportunity was lost.
Mr. Arens^ Gentlemen, policies seem to be prevailing in the free
world which presuppose that we are engaged in a popularity con-
test with a competing economic system, and that we can win this
struggle with the international Communist empire if we just under-
stand each other a little better, and that we develop an understanding
by exchanging art work, motion pictures, displays, fairs, and the like.
Based upon your experience with communism in reality as distinct
from the fiction which is current, what observation do you care to
make on this approach to the struggle with communism ?
Mr. PiPA. ]Mr. Arens, I would like to say that I do not believe in tlie
sincerity of Communists preaching about a mutual interchange in
cultural relations. Were such an interchange to take place, commu-
nism would lose thereof considerable. The atmosphere propitious to
communism is one of secrecy and conspiracy, of underhand methods
and of hidden truth. If the curtain were removed — which would cer-
tainly happen in case of free cultural interchange — the hideous picture
that would reveal itself to the astonished eyes of the free world would
raise indignation and anger; communism would not have any benefit
from it.
Mr. Akens. Why, then, if the Communists do not like cultural ex-
change, have they entered into arrangements whereby tliey displayed
here in Washington, the seat of our Government, tlie motion picture
"The Cranes Are Flying."' They were sold out downtown on "The
Cranes Are Flying." Seats were at a premium to see this production
of the Communist regime.
Mr. KoTTA. They do not mind sending pictures which spread prop-
aganda for the Communist regime.
Mr. Arens. How would this picture, or how would their fair in
New York City, or any of these cultural exchanges, benefit the Soviet
regime ?
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 31
Mr. KoTTA. The Communist fraud in the whole program is that it
purports to identify in the minds of the free world the Communist
regime and the people whom they hold in bondage. You do not see in
any of these cultural exchanges, in their fairs, in their motion pictures,
in their art work which they send over here, in their ballets, any refer-
ence at all to the terror mechanism of the machinery which holds in
bondage the millions of people that the Communists have subjugated.
You see displayed a little culture, which may or may not contain Com-
munist propaganda as such. But the fallacy of the whole program is
that it tends to convey to the minds of the free world the concept that
the so-called struggle between the free world and the Communist
world is a struggle between peoples as such, that is, between the Rus-
sian people and the American people, rather than between a deadly
Communist world apparatus and the remaining free people.
May I say further, as we mention peaceful coexistence and peace-
ful competition, that the Soviet rulers have always made it clear that
they wanted to conquer the world. Lenin said that, and Stalin said it
after him. Then Krushchev said it, and he added that the Commmiists
are going to renounce their goal when "a shrimp learns to whistle."
Now Mr. Khrushchev says, "Let's forget about the cold war. I
want peaceful coexistence." But not long ago, at Novosibirsk on
October 10, shortly after his visit to the United States, Khrushchev
defined coexistence like this :
Coexistence means continuation of the struggle between the
two social systems — but by peaceful means, without war,
without interference by one state in the internal affairs of
another. We consider it to be economic, political, and ideo-
logical struggle, but not military.
Now, the very phrase of "cold war" has become an anathema to the
West, thanks to the Soviet propaganda ; but this peaceful coexistence,
as defuied by Mr. Khrushchev, is nothing but cold war at its worst.
Wliat the Kremlin wants is to lull the West into complacency. They
are trying to get the West to recognize the status quo, so that they may
finally succeed in convincing the captive peoples throughout the Com-
munist empire that it is useless to resist them, because they consider
that the resistance of the captive nations to communism is one of the
major deterrents to their plans of world conquest.
This is what the peaceful coexistence launched by Mr. Khrushchev
means.
Mr. PiPA. The Kremlin's pretense of peace is all a falsity. Com-
munism is characterized by the most unscrupulous machiavellism ;
they are quite different things what Communists say and what they do.
I might say here good words, beautiful words, about something which
is in reality bad. That is what the Communists are doing. People
who do not know them well, people who do not have the marks of their
violence on their bodies, may be deceived by their propaganda. A
wise policy, however, should remedy it.
Mr. Arens. Mr. Pipa, can you now, on this record, recount, while
you are still under oath, from your own experiences, what commu-
nism in action means in reality, as distinct from what Khrushchev says
and has said here in the United States ?
Mr. PiPA. In reality, communism means the system of prisons and
slave labor camps. It means the repression of freedom of press, of
32 THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV
freedom of gathering, of freedom of worship, and, in general, of what
are called civil rights and human rights.
Mr. Arens. Tell us a word about your own experiences in the slave
labor camps as a captive of Khrushchev's Communist apparatus.
Mr. PiPA. I would like to tell you something particular in this
regard. For the ten years of imprisonment I experienced, I was not
allowed to have books to read in prison, except official literature. This
fact of repression of cultural freedom remained unchanged, under
Stalin's regime as well as under Khrushchev's rule. It would take
too much time to speak here about my experience of prisons and labor
camps — this might be found in my writings. Suffice it to say liere
that during my captivity I was always living under the terror of the
possibility of immediate death ; death by torture and starvation, death
by illnesses contracted in horrible jails, death by inhuman labor con-
ditions in camps.
Mr. Arens. Was physical torture inflicted upon you, sir ?
Mr. PiPA. YeSj sir.
Mr. Arens. Give us a word about that.
Mr. PiPA. When I was arrested, I was beaten so savagely that I
lost consciousness.
Mr. Arens. Why were you beaten savagely ?
Mr. PiPA. Because they wanted me to confess things that were not
true.
Mr. Arens. How did they beat you? With what type of instru-
ments ?
Mr. PiPA. With several types of instruments : a piece of wood, the
butt of a gun, whips ; I was boxed, and kicked, and trampled on. As
a consequence, I could not speak for a month. Beating, however, is
far from being the worst kind of torture in Communist Albania, and
I should be glad to have come out alive; my brother, for instance, died
while being tortured.
Mr. Arens. Khrushchev has described the Communists as hu-
manitarians. Is that consistent with what you are relating?
Mr. PiPA. If you call such things humanitarian, I would agree
with him.
Mr. Arens. Can the free world believe Khrushchev's professions of
peaceful intent?
Mr, KoTTA. At its own risk. If the West were to believe the pro-
fessions of peace and friendship of Khrushchev and be lulled into com-
placency, the Soviet Union would succeed in gaining further foot-
holds, and would at some time be so strong that it would either by
military means or otherwise crush the free world.
]Mr. Arens. Can the free world trust Khrushchev in any interna-
tional summit conferences?
Mr. KoTTA. No.
Mr. PiPA. Certainly not.
Mr. Arens. Why not?
]SIr. PiPA. An international conference is regarded by Communists
as just another weapon in the cold war. The world should not be-
lieve what they say in conferences, because it is the dominant feature
of Communists to deny with actions what they say in words. It has
been proved so many times during the history of communism that
only naive people, not enough enlightened, may believe it.
THE CRIMES OF KHRUSHCHEV 33
Mr. KoTTA. If my memory does not betray me, a committee of the
American Congress has established that the Soviet Union has vioLated
some thousand treaties with other countries. If the Soviet Union has
violated a thousand treaties, how can you believe that the Soviet
Union will respect any treaties which it might enter into with the free
world in the future ?
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Mr. Kotta and Mr. Pipa.
(Whereupon, at 12:30 p.m., the consultations were concluded.)
INDEX
Individuals
Page
Bacilek, Karol 10, 11
Benes, Eduard 1, lo
Beria (Lavrenti) 2")
Buzalka, Michal (Bishop) 13
dementis, Vladimir 11
Dechet, Jan 20
Eisenhower (Dwight D.) 27
Frecer 9
Gjoni (Marina) (Arclibishop) 20
Gojdic, Peter (Bishop) 21
Gottwald (Klement) 8
Hopko, Basil (Bishop) 21
Husak, Gustav 11
Kanak 9
Klirnshchev, Nikita 1-5, 8, 11, 15, 10, 21, 25-28, 31, 32
Klucik 9
Kotta, Niici 4, 23-33 (statement)
Lenin (V. I.) 31
Martinka (Reverend) 9
Milan (Reverend) 9
Nemec, John (Rev.) 9.
Pauco, Joseph 1.2,7-1(5 (statement)
Pipa, Arshi 4,5,23-33 (statement)
Prennushi, P. Vincenc (Msgr.) 20
Salat, Anthony (Rev.) 9
Seda (Reverend) 9
Shehu (Mehmet) 4, 20
Sindler 9
Siroky, Viliam 11
Skrabik, Andrej 20
Slamen, Francis 9
Stalin (Josef) 5, 25, 20, 81, 32
Staudinger 9
Svoboda (Ludwig) 1, 10
Tiso, Jozef 2, 10, 14
Tito (Josip Broz) ^^ 30
Tuka, Vojtech (Bela) 11
Turanec 9
Varoshi, Mustafa 29
Vojtassak, Jan (Bishop) 12, 22, 23
Volaj (Bishop) 29
Zubek, Theodoric Joseph 3, 10-23 (statement)
Zverin 9
Organizations
Assembly of Captive European Nations 4, 24
Catholic Action (Slovakia) 18, 19, 21
Clergy Committees for Furtherance of Peace (Slovakia) 20
Communist Party, Slovakia 11
i
11 INDEX
Concentration Camps : Slovakia : Page
Jachymov 2, 14
Leopoldov 12, 14
Muceniliy 2, 14
Novaky 2,14
Presov 2, 14
Slovenska Lupca 9
National Committee for a Free Albania _ 24
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) 24, 25
Slovak Democratic Party 11
Slovak National Council Abroad 1, 7, 12
Slovakia, Government of :
Secret Police 11, 12
State Bureau for Ecclesiastical Affairs 19, 20
Society of St. Adalbert (Slovakia) 18
University of Bratislava (Slovakia) 21
Publications
Cranes Are Flying, The (motion picture) 30
Duchovny Pastier (The Spirtual Shepherd) - 18
Jednota (weekly) 7
Katolicke Noviny (Catholic News) 18
Prace (newspaper) 8
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